


Meet the Parents

by zarabithia



Category: Blue Beetle (Comics)
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2008-12-07
Updated: 2008-12-07
Packaged: 2018-01-25 04:16:16
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,309
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1631024
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/zarabithia/pseuds/zarabithia
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Superhero or not, Jaime's boyfriend has to meet the parents.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Meet the Parents

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you to smgriffin for the beta and to cero_ate for the cheerleading and food suggestions.
> 
> Written for Laure

 

 

It was, Jaime supposed, completely inevitable.

The world was fairly safe from any crisis at the moment. He was coming to terms with his bisexuality. He had a great boyfriend, a supportive ex-girlfriend, two understanding parents, and a best friend that could not have been easier to lean on. If Paco was a little slower at coming around...well, the Scarab helpfully reminded Jaime that Paco was usually a little slower in coming around to anything.

Naturally, his parents chose a time when Jaime was feeling nice and secure to spring a conversation that would completely ruin Jaime's life.

"You want to what?" Jaime repeated, staring at his mother dumbly. 

"It's wonderful that you have met someone, Jaime," his mother explained in a calm and rational way that completely belied the fact that she had just ruined his life. "But we know very little about these Titans."

"Outside of what Paco and Brenda have told us," his father mentioned casually, and oh, his father's tone put forth more disdain than Jaime would have thought humanly possible.

"Yes." His mother, of course, was able to outdo his father's disdain by the kind of leaps and bounds that would have impressed Superman. "Paco and Brenda have told us plenty about these Titans of yours. Which is why we worry so much."

"They were having a bad day when we ran into them," Jaime explained. "Or, well, a bad couple of months." Jaime wasn't quite ready to get into he discussion about Kid Flash and Superboy yet. "They aren't always like that!" 

His mother just gave him a look and his father continued the plan to humiliate Jaime to death. "Someday, when you have children, perhaps you will understand how a parent worries. Your mother and I need to meet this boy of yours, Jaime. We know nothing about him. Not his parents, not where he comes from, not what he believes in. Those are all things a parent must be able to trust about the boy dating their child." 

Together, his parents were more unstoppable than any supervillain. Jaime had no choice but to go to his boyfriend and explain his parents' terms.

He took great comfort in knowing that there was absolutely no way that Robin would ever agree to such a silly arrangement.

\----------------

"I think this is a bad idea. Have I mentioned that?" Tim asked. There was the briefest of pauses as Tim reached up and adjusted his mask. Jaime wasn't sure why he bothered. It wasn't as though the mask could slip out of place (they'd certainly done enough fooling around by now that Jaime had come to realize that getting the mask off was as impossible as getting Kid Devil to be serious for longer than two minutes at a time.) Maybe it was a nervous gesture that Jaime didn't understand. 

But then, there was no reason for Robin to be nervous. Due to a line of reasoning that would really only have made sense if Jaime had actually been able to keep his identity secret (for longer than Kid Devil could be serious in any given stretch of time) Tim was being granted the privilege of attending this family function as Robin. There were, according to Batman, far too many other identities involved in the Robin and Batman legacy to allow Jaime the privilege of actually letting his boyfriend come over and have a normal "meet the parents" dinner. Instead of Tim, the Reyes family was going to meet Robin. 

Although Jaime's initial reaction had been annoyance that his family hadn't been deemed trustworthy enough to guard Tim's secret when they did a fine job of guarding Jaime's, as they contemplated going in and sitting down for dinner, Jaime's annoyance turned to envy. 

Considering that Jaime could see the shadows of at least Brenda and Paco from his spot in the driveway as he peeked through the kitchen window, Jaime was pretty sure he would have loved the ability to wear his battle armor into the house. 

Besides, Robin was always in calm, cool, and collected mode. It had taken a while to learn that persona didn't belong to Tim, and without the Scarab's helpful insights on the hero identity game, Jaime might never have figured it out. Jaime owed a lot to Ted Kord and his sacrifices, and the fact that Ted Kord's personal life had been a great testing ground for Jaime's relationship with Tim Drake was just one of the many debts he could never repay. 

"Yeah, you mentioned," Jaime answered. "Unfortunately, my parents can be pretty strict about something once they set their minds to it."

"And they've set their minds to making sure that the superhero their son is dating is good enough for him?" Alone out in their driveway - or well, as alone as they ever were, considering the Scarab's presence, Tim allowed a bit of his true self to seep through the Robin costume. 

"Yeah." Jaime threw Tim a self-conscious grin. "Look at it this way...at least they didn't insist on meeting your parents. I mean, can you imagine? Batman in El Paso?" 

"It's cute that you think he isn't here," Tim said cryptically. 

"He's in the city? Why? And why didn't you tell me that earlier?" 

Tim shrugged. "Would it have mattered? Anyway, is that your sister making faces at us in the kitchen window? Shouldn't we go inside?" 

"That's Milagro alright," Jaime answered, in reply to the pig-tailed creature whose face was currently plastered against the living room window. Her tongue and teeth were doing a passable job of imitating a deep sea creature from a low budget Sci Fi Channel movie. "Let's go in before she starts doing her impersonation of Guy Gardner again." 

"Do I want to know?" Jaime knew that look. It was one that said very clearly, 'I am laughing at you and your crazy discomfort that is not something us sane people ever experience.'

Jaime wondered how crazy his life had become that Batman's sidekick could trump him in saneness.

"Probably not." With a deep breath, Jaime took Tim's hand and entered the house. 

\-------------

Within two minutes of walking in, Jaime realized that yes, in fact, things could actually get worse than being forced to bring Robin home to meet his parents. 

This knowledge became immediately evident as he realized that not only had Paco and Brenda been invited to the family gathering, but so too had Traci.

Great. A meet the parents that featured his ex-girlfriend. 

Jaime let out a deep sigh as Milagro came over and stood at his feet, looking up at Tim critically. "Green Lantern was much cooler," she informed Robin haughtily before waving a plastic Green Lantern souvenir ring at him.

As she ran into the kitchen, Jaime glanced over at Tim. "It can't get much worse, right?" Jaime asked softly. Robin was all about percentages and statistics, after all.

"It's going fine," Tim assured him.

The Scarab was a bit more truthful in his assessment of the situation, and a whole lot more annoying as the Scarab offered a long list of scenarios that could have made the situation worst. 

As he sat down, between his current boyfriend and his ex-girlfriend and across from a smirking Paco and Brenda, he wasn't so sure that the Scarab's list of supervillains attacking El Paso would have been worse than his current fate.

\-------------

"This is very good, Mrs. Reyes," Robin said, right on cue, three bites into their meal. Their mother had certainly gone all out for the night, making chicken enchilada casserole, one of Jaime's favorites. She'd even substituted the regular chiles for the jalopenos, just the way Jaime liked. 

It was an evil ploy designed to make up the fact that his mother and father were determined to humilate him. It wouldn't work, and couldn't be expected to when he was too distracted to concentrate on his dinner. 

"That's very kind of you, Robin," Jaime's mother replied, smiling at him. "But you haven't really had a chance to let the flavors really sink in yet."

Robin grinned. "According to Arsenal, the spicier foods usually don't 'kick in' fully until a half an hour after the meal has been eaten." 

"Arsenal...he is one of the Teen Titans?" Jaime's father asked. 

The Scarab gave a long list of Arsenal's accomplishments, failures, and general previous experience as a hero, as Robin explained, "He used to be. He was a founder of the original branch of Teen Titans -" 

"Did the original Teen Titans have a Green Lantern?" Milagro interrupted. 

"Milagro, don't interrupt," Jaime scolded. 

"Aw, it's kind of cute to watch Jaime defend his boyfriend," Paco mused to Brenda. 

"Shut up, Paco." Brenda's command was accentuated with an arm punch that didn't look very hard to Jaime, but was firm enough to make Paco wince and rub his arm. 

"Some gang member you turned out to be," Traci laughed at Paco's wincing. "Arsenal used to come over for dinner with Green Arrow and Black Canary when they visited Ralph and Sue. Is Arsenal's cooking as bad as Green Arrow's?"

"It's ... almost as spicy," Robin admitted. "Nightwing claims his food is more edible since his daughter was born, though." 

"So everyone in the Bat 'family' is gay?" Paco asked. How Paco arrived at such a conclusion, Jaime didn't know.

"Paco!" Brenda expressed Jaime's mortification for him, with another arm punch. Jaime would have liked to have joined her, but he was a tad too busy being distracted by the very chatty "helpful" commentary of the Scarab, who wanted to fill him in on the levels of gay that the various Bat family members enjoyed.

"It's alright, Brenda," Robin said, warmly enough that even Paco had to understand why Robin had been the number one choice of at least three members of the Teen Titans for boyfriend material. Much more, if you counted dead Teen Titans, and more still if you counted Titans that had come before the current line-up. "And to answer your question, Paco, that depends on how you define gay." 

"How is their more than one definition of gay?" Paco demanded.

Brenda rolled her eyes. "The same way that Jaime likes girls and boys, and some people just like boys?" 

"And some people like neither one," Traci said helpfully. That confused Jaime a bit. He'd have to ask either the geek squad or the Scarab about that later. 

"How do you not like either one?" Paco asked. "All I'm trying to figure out is which direction Nightwing swings, and if Batman and Superman are really gay for each other."

Tim tilted his head. "Knoweldge is power. What do you intend to do with that power?" 

"Nothing," Paco said, entirely too defensively.

"In this case, nothing means he has money riding on a bet," Brenda informed Tim helpfully.

"Paco! You aren't betting again." Jaime's father was quick in his disapproval. 

"No! I'm just curious...and we weren't talking about me, we were talking about the gayness of Robin's family," Paco reminded them. 

"Which I'm sure no one wants to talk about at the dinner table," Jaime said pointedly. 

"Oh, I'm sure as long as it stays a PG discussion, it will be fine," Jaime's father replied. 

"But Milagro! We don't want to scar her for life!" Jaime protested futilely.

"Dude, I'm sure there are many other factors of our lives that will scar her much more than your boyfriend's gay family," Paco answered. 

That may have caused a snicker from Traci, but Jaime liked to think she hadn't join the brigade out to make his life miserable, too. He could always chalk any random snickers up to the Scarab...who definitely was making fun of him.

"Yeah, like our house getting blown up," Milagro replied, enthusiastically. "By the stupid imaginary aliens."

"They weren't imaginary," Jaime grumbled. 

"Everyone thought they were," Milagro said, sticking her tongue out. 

"Imaginary aliens can't blow up houses," Traci said reasonably. 

"And I saw one. Threatened to beat it with a stick," Paco said proudly. "Brenda was there. She saw it."

"Yeah, I'm sure that's what made it leave," Brenda muttered, taking a bite into part of her enchilada. 

"We know so little bout your family," Jaime's mother commented to Robin, with the magical ability she had to ignore the commentary of the dinner table. Jaime wished he had inherited that skill. "You consider Nightwing and Batman 'family' then?" 

There was a pause, and Jaime knew that was getting into dangerous territory. "Yes," Robin finally admitted. "To some extent, all my teammates are, even the Titans - "

"Eww, dude, that makes you and Jaime incestuous," Paco stated. 

Jaime kicked him hard under the chair. "Please continue, Robin, and ignore the white martian that has taken over Paco's seat at the dinner table." 

When the Scarab asked if he should start preparing weapon strategies to take out Paco, Jaime was very, very tempted to say yes. 

"...But those in Gotham hold the strongest ties," Robin finished, after only a slight pause to consider what a creepy best friend Jaime had. 

"Your other family is okay with this?" Jaime's mother asked. "How your parents must feel to know that their son is spending his nights with Batman and fighting the kind of awful creatures that Batman fights..."

"I really don't think Robin is allowed to talk about that part of his life, " Jaime said pointedly. He really didn't expect it to do much good at this point, as his family and friends had been ignoring him all night, but much to his pleasant surprise, his mother didn't press the issue.

Gracias a Dios.

Still, Tim was in Robin mode, which meant he felt obligated to answer the unasked question. "I'm sure my parents feel the same way you do when Jaime goes out on patrol." 

"Then I feel sorry for your poor mother and father," Jaime's mother replied. She smiled kindly at Tim and though Robin returned it, Jaime wanted nothing more than to be eaten alive by a random hole in the floor.

Or a supervillain. Jaime wasn't really picky on that score.

"I do too," Tim said quietly. 

As the awkward silence descended over the table, Jaime reached underneath the table and squeezed Tim's hand. 

He was rewarded with a tiny Robin squeeze back. 

"You still didn't answer my question," Milagro complained as Jaime's mother got up to get dessert for them. 

Jaime wasn't sure what question she was talking about, but Robin was quick to answer her. "I'm afraid Green Lantern was not one of the original Teen Titans, Milagro."

Milagro waved her plastic Green Lantern ring at Robin and was no doubt set to tell Robin just how much the Teen Titans were not up to her standards, when Traci helpfully interrupted. "But the Titans did have a Green Lantern in their line-up, once."

"Really?" Milagro asked, sounding almost disappointed that her brother's team didn't suck as much as she had originally thought. 

"Yes...though I believe, from what I've read, it was a different Green Lantern than the one you are familiar with," Robin explained to Milagro. 

"Well, the Teen Titans suck," Milago opined. "Because my Green Lantern was the best."

"Language, Milagro," Jaime's father scolded lightly as the sopapillas with honey was set in front of them. 

"Hey, that's my team!" Jaime protested. 

Milagro nodded wisely. "They let you in. That proves they su - are a bad team." 

"Man, in the Mirror Universe, I have a sister who loves me," Jaime sighed. 

"In that same verse, Red Hood is sane," Robin joked lightly. 

"Between your science and my scarab, think we can find that verse?" Jaime asked. "Because I don't know about you, but I'm definitely in the mood for a vacation." 

"No escaping until dinner is over," Jaime's mother scolded lightly.

Jaime sighed and sunk into his chair. Even the sopapillas with honey which normally tasted wonderful, was slightly less wonderful than it normally would have been.

\-------------

Dinner was followed with a board game, during which Paco cheated and Traci and Brenda sat...suspiciously close to one another (far closer than Jaime dared to sit with Robin, even if Milagro hadn't spent the entire time forcing her way between them and boring Robin with Green Lantern stories.) 

It was only after the board game had been finished that Robin was allowed to take his leave. He was very polite, standing up and shaking hands with Jaime's father. Jaime suspected that shaking Jaime's mother's hand had been his goal, but he was wrapped in a hug instead.

The wrong Robin for casual touching, Cassie had commented more than once, and Jaime knew that to be true, but after a momentary awkwardness, Tim hugged her back while Jaime's father reminded him to take good care of their son. 

Jaime listened to Paco and Brenda snickering in the background while he stood off to the side, thinking it wasn't too late for that hole to come along and save the day. 

"Dinner was really great, Mrs. Reyes," Robin said sincerely. 

"Probably not at all what you're used to with that Northeastern cooking," Jaime's mother remarked. 

"No...our dinners are a bit more...English," Tim admitted. "But it was very good, nonetheless." 

"Well, you are welcome to come back anytime," Jaime's father assured him. 

"I'd like that," Tim told him.

"If you really meant that, you're crazy," Jaime remarked as they departed the house. "If, on the other hand, you were just being polite, then you are the best liar ever. Because no one has ever been able to get through my mom's lie detector."

"I lie to Batman," Robin replied easily. Jaime supposed that was supposed to mean that he could lie to anyone...but it would be easier to lie to Batman than to his mom, Jaime was pretty sure. "But I was sincere this time. You have... a really wonderful family, Jaime."

"I have insane friends, nosy parents, and crazy sister," Jaime corrected.

"I beat you by having two crazy brothers," Tim said lightly. "And one brother that goes crazy occasionally and hangs out with Deathstroke the Terminator."

"Milagro would probably grow up to be Deathstroke's sidekick, after Guy Gardner told her no. Besides, crazy sisters totally beat crazy brothers," Jaime answered. "Got any of those?" 

"...Depends on how you define sister," Tim replied. 

"Annoying female you have to love because your parents say so and because murder is still illegal," Jaime quipped.

He was rewarded with a small chuckle. "We can compare notes on crazy siblings more when you get to come to Gotham to meet my family." 

"...You're kidding, right?" 

"You want to be the person to tell Batman no?" 

"...No." Jaime sighed. His whole life was tragic. "Do I at least get a kiss goodnight?" 

Tim peered over Jaime's shoulder. "I think, considering the audience we have, that should wait until we're out of seeing range." 

Jaime didn't bother to turn around. Instead, he picked up his boyfriend and headed towards Gotham.

\-------------

By the time the boys had reached flight, Bruce ended the connection on his end. The boys did deserve some privacy, after all. They certainly hadn't had it all night.

While Bruce wasn't sure that there would ever be a "meeting" of the parents with Jaime Reyes coming over to the Manor, he was sure that Jaime's family had passed the test and proven themselves to be an atmosphere appropriate for Robin.

After the year Tim had endured with his parents, Kon-El and Bart Allen, and Stephanie's return, Tim deserved that much, and Bruce was determined to give it to him. He'd already met Jaime, of course, and checking up on the rest of the Reyes family had been on his list. 

Bruce almost wished he could thank Jaime's parents for making his vigilance so easy.

 


End file.
